Thinking Outside the Bar

e.g. Wearable Computing

Ron.A.Dolin@radicallaw.com

Wearable Law? Pocket Attorney?

At my fingertips, seamless, continuous, private

Adjustable risk profiles

At this speed and location, you have a 5% chance of $100 speeding ticket, and $300/year increase in insurance premiums.

Realtime dispute resolution

This 1-week eviction notice is invalid and will not be enforced.

E-Health Records > E-Law Records

Documents (like cash) electronic if at all

Wearable Law? Pocket Attorney?

Evolution: Currently

Raz: institutionalized normsJudiciary: lots of judges

Executive: lots of administrators, police

Legislature: lots of ...

Current Law Is People Intensive

Interpretation

Enforcement

First Steps Digitizing Current Practice Is Enabling

E-signatures

Automated NDA's

XML standards for statutes, briefs, opinions

Components with API's (e.g. hourly rates)

Free, online: some caselaw, statutes, patents

Virtual law practice (e.g. wills)

Computer-Aided doc review

(Some) electronic courtrooms

Revolutionary: Orders of Magnitude

Scalable: domain expert, engineer, designer

Informatics perspective: set of legal functionsInterpretation: automated dispute resolution

Enforcement: autonomous vehicles

Creation: crowdsourcing?

How do we get there? Software!

Revolutionary: Orders of Magnitude

Scalable: domain expert, engineer, designer

ODR, TFR

Semi-automated contracts

Lessig: Code Is Law

More societal behavior controlled by software.

Software becomes part interpretation (how fast is safe), enforcer (sets max speed), etc.

Is driving (always) a commoditized activity?

Should (autonomous) vehicles have to drive the speed limit?

Should we be allowed to break the law?

Fair? No e-book lending? Who should decide?

Is there an inherent trade-off between efficiency and fairness?

Lessig: Code Is Law

Should cars have to drive the speed limit?

Should we be allowed to break the law? What about civil disobedience?

No e-book lending? Who should decide?

Is there an inherent trade-off between efficiency and fairness? accuracy?

Legal Processes

Goals of Legal Technology

False dichotomy: not mutually exclusive:

Efficiency

Accuracy

Fairness

Access

Often (semi-) automation improves all four:when applied correctly.

Leave for humans what humans do best.

Where is some of this work going on?

Legal Technology Startups

Plenty of talks today on existing startups, so for those thinking about doing a new one...

General startup rules apply, but in particular:Founders: compatible and comprehensive

Market: Goldilocks juuuuust right

Inefficiencies that are ripe for disruption:

those who pay must see benefit

the billable hour is antithetical to efficiency

Legal Technology Startups

Founders

Timing: Juuust Right; Ripe

Feasibility

Teaching Legal Technology

What is the context under which legal technology will be adopted?

Where are the disruptable inefficiencies?

What is a computational perspective on legal problems?

Which technologies might be most applicable?

What can we learn from other fields?

Can we help solve the Justice Gap?

What are the relevant philosophical issues?

Student Paper Topics (see Wikipedia)

Automating M&A

Ethnographic Studies of Online Legal Help

When to Use Automation

e-Book Lending

Corporate Use of Legal Technology

Impact of Electronic Voting on Governance

Visualizations for Patent Analysis

etc.

Cal Bar LPMT Section

Guest Editing The Future of Legal Tech:

Access-2-Justice law school clinics

Overview of modern legal tech tools

Online dispute resolution

Online delivery of legal info & services

Analytics and prediction

VC perspective of legal tech market

Visualizing legal research

Legal tech syllabus for law school

Legal tech startups

Minimal Participants

Law

Computer & Information Science

Design

Business

Foundations (e.g. Kauffman)

Standards Organizations (e.g. OASIS)

Government, Academics, Industry

Training & Education

Academia

Broader curriculum

Survey course

Design, startups

Computational/informatics analysis

Clinics and practical training

Programs

Interdisciplinary

1-year masters in legal informatics/technology

Ph.D. in Legal Informatics

More research and peer-reviewed publications

Centers

Interdisciplinary

Community

Standards

Prototypes

Core research (faculty support)

Conferences (academic, trade)

Funding

Industry

ROI includes opportunity costs, often weighing against in-house solutions

Adoption by legal depts and law firms, perhaps an increase in legal tech budgeting

More design and innovation by providers

More consumer focused products

Collaboration with non-industry

Grants

VC funding

Government

Agencies

Promoting standards and API's

Providing public information for free (not to mention free of )!

Adoption/promotion of new legal technology

Bars

Protecting Clients vs. The Profession

Ethics rules

Mandate tech training for accreditation

Promote technology to resolve Justice Gap

Listen to Sections and Task Forces

What Is Law?

not just rulesnot just proceduresnot just a profession

Dworkin: Law is an attitude

of thinking outside the bar.

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Legal Process(no data was harmed, uh, used, in the making of this graph)Efficiency (%)Accuracy (%)

Current

Coin Toss9753

ADR50507

TFR77777

Courts (paper)207515

Courts (elec)408010

Manual Review10507

CA Review68687

Kafka: The Trial353

M&A K's30607

Kiiac K's60857